导出博客文章NORMAN, Okla.
Wholesale Retro Jordans Cheap . -- Oklahoma coach Lon Kruger doesnt expect his Sooners to reach last years Final Four-level status immediately with so many new faces.Thats why hes fine with the baby steps they took on Tuesday. Freshman Kristian Doolittle scored 17 points to help Oklahoma defeat Northern Colorado 87-66.The young Sooners have three new starters, and four freshmen played at least 10 minutes against the Bears.Theres not an unrealistic expectation from my perspective, Kruger said. Weve got a lot of work to do. We need a lot of reps. These games are all great for us. Every time these guys get on the floor and get a little more comfortable and identify their role in a game situation, its huge for us.Doolittle did his damage on 7-for-8 shooting and added five rebounds in just 18 minutes off the bench. He scored 11 points in the second half to help the Sooners pull away.Jordan Woodard had 14 points, nine rebounds and seven assists. He didnt know he was so close to a triple-double.I just got some rebounds, he said. I was just trying to be aggressive. Coach wanted everybody to stay in attack mode.Christian James added 14 points and seven rebounds for the Sooners (5-1), who shot 54 percent from the field.Jordan Davis had 15 points and seven assists, DJ Miles scored 11 points and Chaz Glotta added 10 points for Northern Colorado (2-5).Oklahoma led 40-34 at halftime behind seven points, six rebounds and four assists from Woodard. Northern Colorado scored the first five points of the second half to cut Oklahomas lead to 40-39, but the Sooners finally got things going. A technical foul against Northern Colorado coach Jeff Linder helped spark the Sooners to a 10-point lead with about nine minutes to play. Woodard sent the fans to the exits when he made a circus layup and was fouled to put the Sooners up 79-61 with about three minutes to go.The Sooners outrebounded Northern Colorado 26-16 in the second half, and the Bears committed 15 turnovers overall.With their length and athleticism, they can make a few more mistakes than we can and kind of make up for it, Linder said.BIG PICTURENorthern Colorado: The Bears were battle tested with losses to traditionally strong programs Butler, Santa Clara, Arizona and Bucknell. They hung tough with the Sooners until the final minutes, and may be a handful for teams in the Big Sky Conference.These guys, for being such a young team, and a new coaching staff, they have not shown one ounce of fear, Linder said.Oklahoma: The Sooners struggled against a non-power five conference opponent for the second straight game -- they defeated Abilene Christian 72-64 last Friday.STAT LINESOklahoma center Khadeem Lattin had five blocks and three steals to go with 10 points. He spearheaded a defense that allowed just 36.6 percent shooting.He affected a lot of things on the defensive end, Kruger said.NEW STARTERMatt Freeman, a freshman from New Zealand, got his first start in Doolittles place. He didnt score and took just two shots in 13 minutes.Doolittle said not starting for the first time this season affected him.To say the least, but I didnt take it personally, he said. I have all the faith in the world in Matt to go out there and do a great job.UP NEXTNorthern Colorado hosts Northern New Mexico on Saturday.Oklahoma travels to No. 17 Wisconsin on Saturday. The Sooners will have their best chance to shake off their sluggish play and show they havent fallen off too much since Buddy Hield left for the NBA.Good challenge there, Kruger said. Kohl Center is a tough place to play. A top-ranked team -- we respect that. Weve got to go in there and value the ball and compete like crazy on the boards and defensively.---Follow Cliff Brunt on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/CliffBruntAP .
Cheap Retro Jordans For Sale . The native of Mont-Tremblant, Que., captured a World Cup downhill event Saturday, his second this year and fifth career victory on the circuit.
Cheap Jordans From China . Peter Gammons, an analyst for Major League Baseballs network and website, drew the ire of hockey fans on Sunday when he criticized the two NHL teams on Twitter for their physical game the night before.
http://www.cheapjordanfromchina.com/ . -- Ken Appleby made 32 saves for his first shutout of the season to lead the Oshawa Generals to a 2-0 win over the Belleville Bulls on Wednesday in Ontario Hockey League action. NEW YORK -- Wade Miley hears the talk about lifting the bottom of the strike zone in an effort to spark offense and insists there has been too much tinkering already.I dont know why they just cant leave the game alone, the Seattle pitcher said. Cant we just go play and try to get three outs and go from there?Concerned about the drop in offense in recent years, Major League Baseball has studied whether to restore the lower edge of the strike zone from just beneath the kneecap to its pre-1996 level -- at the top of the kneecap. Any change for 2017 would require an agreement with the players association, which is skeptical. Membership is split.I think its kind of outrageous what theyre trying to do with the strike zone, Los Angeles Dodgers left-hander Alex Wood said. Obviously, Im biased. Im a pitcher. But at the same time, its shrunk drastically, maybe even in the last five or six years.Baseball people talk about the strike zone the way most discuss the weather: constant complaints about hard-to-fathom change.Wood threw 11.9 percent of his pitches last year at the bottom of the strike zone, according to Fangraphs, which defined the lowest portion as between 1.5 and 1.75 feet off the ground. That was the highest-percentage in the major leagues, just ahead of Minnesotas Kyle Gibson at 11.3 percent and Mileys 11 percent.When the strike zone was last changed, umpires took years to adjust.MLB has used computer software to track umpires strike zones since 2001, which has helped bring the umpiring staff into closer alignment on balls and strikes. Umpires receive a grade now after every game worked behind the plate, and that has resulted in an expansion of the strike zone over much of the past decade.Any adjustment to a new rule-book definition would take time.Theyd have to start in the minor leagues. I think for some of the guys to try to adjust to a new strike zone is going to be chaotic, said umpire Bob Davidson, who worked his first big league game in 1982. I hope they just leave it the way it is. I think we call it now the way the rule book states.Offense has increased this season. Through Thursdays games, the big league batting average is .256, the highest for a first half since 2010, and teams have combined for 2.31 homers per game, the most in the first half since the Steroids Era peak in 20000.
Wholesale Retro Jordans China. But one trend remains constant: strikeouts.Teams combined to average 15.95 strikeouts per game in June, the third-highest month in major league history behind September 2015 (15.96) and April 2016 (16.26), according to the Elias Sports Bureau. The last 28 months dating to September 2011 are the highest-strikeout 28 months in big league history.Were at an interesting time in the game, Gibson said. I think they should ask players about strikeouts and how much they care about strikeouts because I dont think its as frowned-upon as it used to be -- because a guy whos striking out a lot is probably also hitting a lot of homers. And if you ask anybody in here if theyll take a 150-strikeout and 30-homer year, theyre going to say, yeah, sign me up.The strike zone has changed many times -- by definition, not just opinion, like Chicago Cubs manager Joe Maddon calling Laz Diazs zone last weekend amorphic. The top was moved from the armpits to the top of the shoulders ahead of the 1963 season, then lowered before 1969 following a drop in offense and redefined in 1988 as the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants.If the bottom came up, would the top come up, too? said Toronto pitcher R.A. Dickey, the 2012 NL Cy Young Award winner. If they want to introduce an era of better offense, then that would be one way to go, for sure. Because if youre having to elevate balls, thats right into the swing path of most hitters.But just raising the bottom alone likely would result in only a slight change.I think thats a tough pitch for umpires to call already. Not only are they blocked a little bit by the catcher, but the pitches that I throw down there arent straight four-seamers. Theyre sinking down already, Gibson said. I think most of those probably arent called strikes. Theyre probably groundballs or swings and misses or foul balls. ... But, yeah, raising the strike zone for me is going to be a little more difficult, depending on how they call that. But its just like any other rule change. Just like the slide rule at second. Im going to have to make an adjustment and hopefully its not an adjustment that causes me to get hit a whole lot. ' ' '